I read and then write about what I read.

Category: non-fiction

Rating: ★★★★ 27/10/18 A few years ago, The Times newspaper ran a headline on the front page which said ‘Hawking: God Did Not Create Universe’. The article was illustrated. God was shown in a drawing by Michelangelo, looking thunderous. They printed a photo of me, looking smug. They made it look like a duel between us. … More Brief Answers to the Big Questions – Stephen Hawking

Rating: ★★★★ 01/06/18 …don’t just describe an emotion, arouse it, make them experience it, by manipulating the symbol of the emotion… ― Tom Wolfe, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test The New Journalism is a 1973 book that explains the concept behind the “new” kind of journalism presented by Tom Wolfe – and I say “new” because … More The New Journalism – Tom Wolfe

Rating: ★★★★ 05/01/18 People thus had three choices when they encountered the Other: They could choose war, they could build a wall around themselves, or they could enter into dialogue. There are many cases in which someone – taking advantage of a renowned name – just grabs a couple of unrelated essays and makes a book. … More The Other – Ryszard Kapuściński

Rating: ★★★★ 24/12/17 The problem, Paulinus, is not that we have a short life, but that we waste time. Life is long and there is enough of it for satisfying personal accomplishments if we use our hours well.But when time is squandered in the pursuit of pleasure or vain idleness, when it is spent with no … More On The Shortness Of Life: De Brevitate Vitae – Seneca

Rating: ★★★★★ 24/09/17 How much less companionable than silence is the language of falsehood. – St Augustine, City of God, XIX, vii; Montaigne cites Pliny from J. L. Vives’ note. An unpopular essay We shall now proceed to discuss the nature of lying. Actually, this is a selfish act; it’s a way to remind myself that … More On liars – Michel de Montaigne

Rating: A testimony that can’t be rated. 24/03/17 March 24, 1976. A dictatorship started ruling Argentina; the era of kidnapping and torturing any enemy of the state had begun. Bodies vanishing into thin air. The following year, writer and journalist Rodolfo Walsh sent a letter (Open Letter From a Writer to the Military Junta) … More Carta abierta de un escritor a la Junta Militar – Rodolfo Walsh

Rating: ★★★ 18/02/17 How does one become a pessimist? By reading your book, pal. You made Schopenhauer look like one of the Teletubbies. It was a fortunate thing that I didn’t read this during my impressionable adolescence. I still can’t rate it I think a 3-star rating is a good compromise. Many quotes that pulled on my heartstrings, … More On the Heights of Despair – Emil Cioran

Rating: ★★★★ 16/06/16 in solis sis tibi turba locis. [in lonely places, be a crowd unto yourself.] Tibullus, IV, xiii, 12 (adapted). It didn’t surprise me at all the fact that I was reading the words of a man who lived in the 16th century and mastered completely the art of being timeless. Finding relics of … More On Solitude – Michel de Montaigne

Rating: ★★★ 13/03/16 Philosophy Made Easy Introduction I have always had trouble with sleep. Thoughts are unmanageable, always, but especially at night. I don’t like waking up early (of course, that is what the office expects of me). I hate it, actually. Pure, unadulterated hatred. But I’ll definitely be up at 6 o’clock on a … More On Sleep and Sleeplessness – Aristotle

Rating: ★★★★★ 05/01/16 Does anything in nature despair except man? September 15th I feel inadequate. I have made an open place, a place for meditation. What if I cannot find myself inside it? For a long time now, every meeting with another human being has been a collision. I feel too much, sense too much, … More Journal of a Solitude – May Sarton